Monday, November 14, 2011

An Autumn Weekend at Darlington

It was a lovely weekend in the Hudson River Valley this past weekend. Not too cold, and not too warm. A perfectly sublime late-autumn stretch of days, really.

The trees held on to their leaves later than usual this year. By this past weekend, however, most of the remaining leaves had begun to drop. I suspect that the rest of the leaves will have fallen by this coming weekend, when we return to Darlington House after a busy week of work in Manhattan.

The farmers' market in the nearby town was bursting with the final bounty of the season. Boy picked up this ornamental kale there on Saturday from Cedar Farm, a local wholesaler of cut flowers who is one of the salwarts of the market.

He made a lovely, simple arrangement of it for our dining room, where it decorated the table during a dinner we had with our friends Jasper Lambert and Francesca Montmore, who were visiting us for the weekend.

The arrangement looked particularly good with the amethyst colored glasses and green feather edge creamware plates that Boy chose for the table.

Outside, one of our maples still held on to its leaves, one of the last on our property to do so.

Our scarlet oak was in full color, and will be one of the sole trees on our property to hold on to its leaves throughout the winter, a characteristic of oaks.

The leaves on our elm tree had turned a beguiling yellow, tinged with brown. They had mostly dropped by the time we left on Sunday.

The allee of crab apples on our property was loaded with red fruit, wating to be harvested by the birds who will denude the trees over the next several weeks.

This year was a particularly good one for our boxood, which remained a gorgeous, healthy green. We protect the boxwoods at Darlington from being damaged during the snowy season by having them wrapped in burlap.

The remaining herbs in the pots on our terrace were on their last legs, with the tenderer ones already having been dug up and their pots stored away until next year. One of the last holdouts as winter approaches was this hardy sage.

Along with rosemary, which continues to thrive. We bring our pots of rosemary indoors for the winter, but we're waiting to do so until we've had several more hard frosts, so they go fully dormant.

On the way back to the city on Sunday afternoon I pulled the car over to the side of the road so that Boy could take this picture of the sunset on his iPhone. It was a fitting cap off to a glorious late autumn weekend.

Wonderful photos--I especially appreciate the one of boxwood--a very beautiful plant, but not often featured like this. The oak leaf is a nice touch.

Those crabapples are a little past their prime now, but next year you should give the birds some competition. Red crabs are eminently edible and also addictive--tart but with an intense fruit flavor. --Road to Parnassus

Hello Reggie:What a wonderful way to spend a weekend, we so enjoy giving house parties ourselves. And, what a pretty table decoration the ornamental Kale made, its colours so beautifully picked up in the glasses and plates.

As you say, no doubt the autumnal fireworks will have largely dissipated by the coming weekend. Winter has already taken Budapest in its grip with sub zero temperatures at night, so it is good to take advantage of milder days whilst one can.

About Me

Saint Grottlesex/Ivy League somewhat-observant Episcopalian WASP living on Manhattan's UES during the week with a career in finance. Weekends I hightail it up to the Hudson River Valley where I'm ruinously restoring and furnishing a jewel of a Federal house with my spouse, Boy Fenwick, and our most-adored pug, Basil, who has decided views on these subjects.